Anybody watch the Army vs Michigan game. I'm getting tired of the talent argument. I don't believe it's valid in most Husker games even after transfers.
Talent gap
- Thread starter Ewooc
- Start date
Anybody watch the Army vs Michigan game. I'm getting tired of the talent argument. I don't believe it's valid in most Husker games even after transfers.
I believe a percentage is mental and this team is very fragile mentally. Plus imo there soft they don’t mind losing kinda like don’t give a crap either way and that I believe comes with the type of players you recruit. We need a lot more type A personality
It doesn't hurt that they are within 5 hours of 60 million people. Itd easier to recruit when your parents can drive and see the game in one dsy
I think you have some valid points. However, I'm also a believer in finding the right guys, not necessarily the best ones. I don't think Wisconsin has had a recruiting class rated higher than Nebraska's at any time since Nebraska joined the B1G, and yet Nebraska has only beaten them once over a span of 8 seasons and 3 coaches, and most of them haven't been very close.
There were many Nebraska players chirping during the week (even an OWH writer said that Nebraska's guys did far more talking than CU's did). There was an article (don't recall which paper) about the Nebraska players from Colorado talking about how glad they were to not be in Boulder. Osborne, Solich, and Pelini all had guys from Colorado on their rosters; you didn't see that sort of thing with those coaches. This goes along with having the "right guys".
As far as Frost goes....I said on another thread that I thought Nebraska was nuts to offer him the job, and I thought he was nuts to take it. To me, one good season at UCF isn't a very good gauge. UCF was 31-9 in the 3 seasons prior to the 0-12 season, so I don't think the program was lacking talent. I give him credit for stabilizing the program, but his last team is an 8-4 team in the SEC or B1G...and, as you well know, Nebraska has fired 2 coaches in the last 15 years that were able to have that record (and better) pretty regularly.
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Osborne inherited a powerhouse, Frost inherited the proverbial **** house as to speak. Frost's hill is a far treacherous climb than was Devaney's and Osborne's
Right and that is what some are failing to realize with Frost and the results we are seeing. Frost came in and took over a bad husker program. A level of bad that most of us alive have never seen. We can't compare him to Solich or Cally or Bo or Riley. Like I said Im not a blind follower of Frost. This is his team now, the losses and mistakes can't be completely blamed on MR anymore. He is making his share of mistakes and I think the program should be a bit farther along than where we are right now, but one also can't completely deny what he walked into.
Jeff Monken has done a great job at Army. I told my KU associates I thought he would have been the perfect hire for them. Unique system, gets the most out of his kids.
On the bright side for Nebraska, they have gotten for the 2018, 2019 classes a lot of kids from Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Kentucky, Oklahoma, Jersey, Arizona with 19 4* players in those classes along with three 4* commits for 2020 so far.
Just like cu and Bill McCartney set their sights on being like Nebraska, Nebraska sights should be aimed at getting as close to tOSU as possible.
Indeed. In the four years before TO's first year as HC, NU was 42-4-2 with two NCs. In the three years of Riley, NU was 18-19. Nebraska was 14-25-1 in the four years before Bob D. took over. So it's very much a rebuild in a much more competitive landscape.
What does "really turn this thing around" even mean? Is it being in the playoffs? Winning the BIG? Winning the West? Making a bowl game? Beating lowly Colorado?
Using a single football game as a foundation to measure the relative athletic talent between two teams is a very shallow take and almost worthless endeavor IMO. They don't call them upsets (sometimes major upsets) for nothing.
I agree with the poster above regarding talent: that when it comes to assessing the value of college football players, experience is a factor at least as important as natural talent.
Experience takes into account skill development which, I believe, is almost uniformly accepted as critical to consistently high performance at the college level.
IMHO, many fans also tend to disregard the major adaptions and adjustments new players need to make to play consistently at the major college level. Quickly adjusting to the higher skill level on the field, mastering the advanced complexity of the position itself as well as the schemes utilized by opponents, the elevated pressure, etc.
All of the foregoing while - just now turning adult - adapting to moving away from home, meeting academic requirements, and dealing with off-field environments (parties, women, etc) Personal responsibility jumps several levels when transitioning from high school to a University away from home. Players who are able to perform well early like Martinez are the exception and even when they do excel, no one (I hope) would argue with the contenion that as talented as he is, he can be even better with more experience.
What devaney did inherit was miss used talent. He just changed practice time and other thing, and remember once those players graduated he struggled in 67 67 in the recruiting class for 69 they hit the jucos to fill voids on the offensive line and other thin spots
Last yr I know we had a culture problem in the locker room, but given that, it looked like it took the staff the first 6 games to determine who were players, and who folded during the games. Finally, the last 6 games they put a decent product on the field, despite no idle weeks for a rest, and enduring a lot of injuries. So I naturally expected the staff to have a head start on what they had to work with for athletes, but it feels like we're still going through those same issues. Add to the fact that Martinez has not had a very good start to the season (including being indecisive). We need to get it together quickly because the B1G is much stronger this yr. JMHOLots of coaches have started poorly and had great success...I mean we are 1-6 in close games...every single one of those game could have been a W if there was 1 extra holding call or 1 extra pass INT call, or a defender slips on wet grass. Or our opponent loses their kicker and is relying on a punter.Frost could literally be 9-5 with the same exact team and execution right now. And 9-5 would look like a miracle with this group. But it wouldn't change actual reality. To be honest there is no such thing as finding a way to win, it is all probability and randomness when it is one score. That is why the only husker teams to win titles were dominant and mashed nearly all of their opponents. And then a coin flip decided games like Missouri 97 or Florida state 93
Agree. This is a young team(offense) & it’s gonna take time. I’m just hoping we look a lot better in October/November. Next year and 2021 we’ll look like a real B10 contender.
I don't know about last year. We had one scholarship qb available...he was a true freshman. Somehow the staff got him ready to play even though he didn't even play a snap his senior year of HS...that in itself should show you the staff was remarkable. Could the staff from the 90s do such a thing? Adrian was very good and we were in position to win HIS FIRST GAME against Colorado when he got hurt. At this point we had to rely on a walk-on backup...we stalled and lost by less than one score. Troy we didn't have a scholarship qb...and so we easily could have started 2-0 going into Michigan if Adrian was healthy. A healthy Adrian also makes the michigan game more competitive. Even keeping that game within 20 makes a meaningful game and learning experience. With a hobbled Adrian it was a worthless experience for all. Wisky 2nd half was really the first time we started to click at all and had Adrian been healthy that likely would have happened much earlier. Wisky may have been competitive. Even with those few extra wins, and more competition against Michigan we could have had the confidence to win the close games against NW , OSU, Iowa. We could have won 8 games with effectively the same team. As bad as Bos classes were at the end they were miles ahead of Riley's and the farther away from Bo the weaker the classes became. So last years seniors would have been recruited by Bo...this years seniors and juniors are a historically weak group. We've had to completely rewire the leadership on the team as a result. Hence why a grad transfer from another power 5 school and a 19 year old are captains. That scared the shiite out of me when I heard it.
Frost had the better credentials than Bo Pelini, Frank Solich, Tom Osborne, Bob Stoops and many other successful coaches. He is the most experienced head coach to be hired since Bob Devaney. He is 1-6 in 1 score games...that percentage cannot sustain over time...its liek overtime records...if he coaches in 1000 one score games he will win 500 and lose 500. If he splits or goes 4-3 we are having a completely different conversation and will be when we get more data points.
huh? Frost has the worst credentials of any hires save maybe Riley.
Bo won a national title as a D Coordinator, Callahan coached in the Super Bowl.
the way you rant makes me think you're a legit crazy person. kinda spooky
And, Mike Riley won 2 Grey Cups and was 6-2 in bowl games. In reality, his credentials weren't really that bad, either.
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What makes you think that percentage can't sustain itself? I hope you have a better answer than "it's Nebraska, and he's Scott Frost".
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Yah, we are sooooo awesome on paper! We kick the crap out of everybody on paper. Too bad those little stars don't measure heart or leadership and also don't show how they are distributed throughout the team. They also don't distinguish between realized talent and potential.
Whoa whoa whoa. Callahan got shellacked in the Super Bowl and had never run a college program. Bo's defense got spanked in multiple games that championship year much the same as his teams did in big games. You better take a look at Frost's resume again. In particular look at the guys who have hired him and he's coached under. Then look at what he did with that UCF program. I acknowledge that UCF's prior staff left him a good starting point with some talent, but you have to be a damned good coach to go undefeated and beat some of the teams they did along the way. Unfortunately AM is NOT M Milton. Not yet anyway. One could argue that Frost's resume was better than Osborne's when he took over for Devaney. FOR NEBRASKA, there's no way in hell you were going to find a guy with a better resume than Frost especially in this day and age. It's going to take him a little more time to build his program than some of us had hoped but I have ZERO doubt that he'll get it done.
if you blindly laid out the resumes of Bo, Callahan, Riley & Frost in front of someone who knew nothing of the additional, off the page context of his fit, I'd be surprised if they said his is best.
no emotions, just what's on paper.
I'm 1 million % behind him and would rather have nobody else leading this program, but from a blind resume standpoint, which was the ranter's context, those are the facts.
Army has 15 senior starters, and five junior starters. Those are grown men who have embraced a warrior mentality from the time they stepped foot at West Point. They have been in the same system their entire football careers, and Monken has been there since 2014. No, they shouldn't be able to hang with Michigan, but they did, and their experience, attitude and unique offensive system are important factors.
We've F'd up every single hire since 2002 and IMO the worst hire of the bunch was Pelini because it took us so long to can him. We've got this hire right this time and Frost will get it done. I have no doubt about it. He's going to get Osborne like time to win big IMO.
That is your opinion, not the facts. IF you're talking about just your average football program in need of a rebuild why in God's name would you pick Mr. 500 Riley, Blowout Bill or a guy who NEVER had run a college program and hated to recruit over a guy who had coached for Snyder, Kelley and either played or coached for some of the best coaches in the NFL? A guy who had taken an 0-12 team to an undefeated season in 2 years..... Forget the history with the Huskers, just his college football history should be enough but add in his NFL experience. Good heavens, IMO, it wouldn't have been close for me if I'm looking at those resumes.
We may have more talent than CU, but there is not that great of a difference. When our team does what it does in crunch time (get tight, play not to lose, get tired, whatever), our talent level is not enough to overcome it. We win some and we lose some. But judging by the eye test, our size and team speed is nothing special compared to most other programs.
It's twue its twue lil buckaroo. Frost is the guy. It may take a little longer than we had hoped. The UCF deal was no fluke. We just have to develop our Milton and it will happen. AM isn't there yet. Clearly he's got some growing to do yet. Milton was just fearless in how he played. AM is not. Not yet.
Not sure how you knock someone for losing a Super Bowl. The reason the score was out of had was that Tampa Bay returned 3 interceptions for TDs. Callahan didn't throw those. Bill Beli
I'm a believer in the right talent, not just the best talent. I don't think there's been a year since Nebraska joined the B1G that Wisconsin has had a higher rated recruiting class than Nebraska, and yet they've kind of dominated the series since 2011.
It also seems that there's quite a few guys that were running off at the mouth before the CU game (even one of the OWH writers, who was pretty critical of CU's fans, admitted that Nebraska's guys did most of the talking that week). There was an article (don't recall which paper), in which the Nebraska players from Colorado were talking about how they were glad they weren't in Boulder. Osborne, Solich, and Pelini all had guys from Colorado, and you didn't see that sort of stuff under their watch.
Take all that for what it's worth.
Let's compare Army and Michigan's records at the end of the year and see if the talent is still looking pretty meaningless.
“For Husker fans, IOWA is one of those "it" teams, they easily attract talent, have good coaching, and of course, players. Nebraska has a lot of catching up to do when IOWA is the team to beat, talent, coaching wise, and lately has had more NFL draft success.”
FIFY
FIFY
Love your optimism! I am not saying we won’t return to greatness. In fact I think we will. I should have made that more clear. I just don’t think it is certain that we will.
I'm no fan of Pelini, but that's revisionist history. Fact is Frost had been a head coach for 2 years after being a position coach/coordinator for a prolific offensive play caller.
Like I said, from a blind resume standpoint his was the lightest at the point of hiring, objectively speaking. It's not a slight and frankly I'd have hired him instead of Bo with no head coaching experience and given him a lifetime contract.
If Frost can't win here, nobody can. I've said it before and will continue to believe that. He's our guy, and the best man for the job.
I still don't get how you can say that Pelini had a better resume to be a head coach. Hell I wouldn't have hired him again to be the DC. His defenses OFTEN had games where they just fell apart even at LSU. I think it happened twice to him that national championship year. Pelini had ZERO experience as a head coach. Frost had demonstrated proficiency at building and leading a college football program. A-Z. He had coached both sides of the ball. Pelini had exhibited neither the aptitude nor the temperament to be a head coach. I just shrugged my shoulders and figured Tom knew best when he hired him. Wrong answer.